Florida man who beat elderly Philadelphian to death sentenced to decades in prison

Two families stood before a judge on Wednesday with opposing views of justice.

Relatives of Mauricio Gesmundo Sr. — an 83-year-old man who was bound and beaten to death in his Philadelphia home four years ago — urged harsh punishment for what they said was a vicious, deliberate slaying of a beloved patriarch.

The family of the man who confessed to the killing, Jacob McMann, pleaded for mercy, portraying the killing as an uncharacteristic act by a young man who had long struggled with developmental and mental health challenges.

After hearing from both sides, Common Pleas Court Judge Scott O’Keefe sentenced McMann to 30 to 50 years in prison.

McMann and another man forced their way into Gesmundo’s Hunting Park home on Dec. 31 2020.

They gagged him with gray duct tape and bound his wrists and ankles with zip ties, and struck him in the head. Then, the men took as much as $50,000 in cash from a bedroom safe — money from an eBay business run by a family member — and left Gesmundo for dead on the living-room floor.

He died from blunt force trauma 17 days later.

But the assailants also left behind crucial evidence, said prosecutor Cydney Pope: the roll of duct tape and a single latex glove bearing McMann’s DNA.

“This is not your everyday murder,” Pope told the judge. Gesmundo, she said, “was a small man who was beaten to death inside his own home only because he answered the door.”

Authorities arrested McMann in September 2021 in Florida, where he lived. In December, he pleaded guilty to murder, conspiracy, robbery, and burglary. But he declined to identify the second man involved in the attack, Pope said — a refusal she asked the judge to weigh when deciding McMann’s fate.

Gesmundo’s son, George Gesmundo, told the judge that his father had come to Philadelphia from the Philippines nearly five decades ago and built a life through long hours and persistence. Gesmundo worked two full-time restaurant jobs to support his wife, Rosie, and their 10 children, his son said.

Later, he spent nearly a decade caring for his aging mother, “until her last breath,” George Gesmundo said.

He loved chess, his son said, and he loved to sing. He sang in the choir at St. Augustine Church — the same church where, in 2021, his funeral Mass was held.

He had survived diabetes, hypertension and three heart attacks, George Gesmundo said, only for a “vicious, premeditated murder … to steal the best and final years of our father’s life.”

McMann’s mother, Michelle Ellis, described her son as a quiet child diagnosed with autism and obsessive-compulsive disorder, conditions she said created serious learning challenges but also shaped him into a sensitive boy.

In special-education classes, she said, “he had an instinct to protect those who were vulnerable.”

“As a mother,” Ellis said through tears, “it’s incredibly painful to see my son in this situation.” She said she still saw the “little boy” she had raised to be kind and thoughtful.

She asked the judge to remember that her son was “more than the circumstances that brought him here today.”

Before the judge pronounced the sentence, McMann read a brief statement in which he said what he had done was “evil.” His crime, he said filled him with “guilt, regret, [and] shame.”

He added: “I look in the mirror and feel disgusted by myself. I hurt this family, and I hurt my family.”

As he handed down the sentence, O’Keefe, the judge, also ordered McMann to pay $9,040 in restitution. Then, he turned to Mauricio Gesmundo’s family.

“I’m terribly sorry for the loss and pain you’re feeling every day,” he said.

Correction: An earlier version of this article misspelled a prosecutor’s name. The prosecutor’s name is Cydney Pope.